Opportunity of Indian Affiliates to Venture Internationally

Alongside the ever growing number of e-commerce players, the affiliate networks and publishers are getting big as well. Many players like CouponzGuru, Coupondunia started out early when the market was not saturated; as the market matured they grew further and took their Indian businesses overseas.

Indian coupon/cashback companies which have ventured overseas

Launched in India in 2011, market leader CouponzGuru recently forayed into international waters, having initiated operations in Singapore in September, 2014 with its website couponzguru.sg. And the company is targeting more countries in the coming months. From the learnings of running a successful and popular couponing business in India, the company is replicating the model in other countries where the concept of affiliate marketing is still fresh.

Cashkaro is looking to expand its operations internationally, within the territories of Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia as reported by techcircle.in here.

International coupon/ cashback companies with Indian presence

Pouringpounds, a cash back and coupons website(in the United Kingdom) is the precursor to their Indian launch of cashback venture – Cashkaro.

Pennyful initiated operations in USA in January, 2011, and launched its Indian counterpart in November, 2011.

Born in Chicago in November, 2008, Groupon has proliferated markets all over the globe, and made its Indian debut in April, 2011.

Vouchercloud, based out of the United Kingdom, has spread its operations into 12 countries including in India.

Imbull founded by Dutch entrepreneur Jochem Vroom, has a presence the world over, and also in India by the name Flipit.

Rocket Internet backed Cuponation is another couponing site with presence in multiple countries including India.

Current Indian e-tail market and size of Affiliate industry

Presently, the Indian online retail market is valued at over INR 21,000 Crore (USD 3.5 billion). It is projected to grow to over INR 88,000 crore (USD 14.5 billion)by 2018, as per research and consultancy firm RNCOS

The affiliate industry is benefitting from the e-commerce boom.

Of the current e-tailing traffic in the nation, 7% – 8% transactions are attributable to affiliates whereas the budget that e-tailers spend on affiliate marketing is a humble 5% – 10% as per Times of India.

StartupWorld.com has reported that as per a survey, 95% buyersadmitted to having searched for deals online, and 74% of such buyers took advantage of couponing sites like CouponzGuru for the most economically efficient purchases.

Global Expansion :Makes Sense why?

Following is the result of Google’s Global Market Finder application, when a marketer in India searches for ‘Coupons’ and ‘Cashback’ opportunities in ‘Emerging Markets’ (sans two not entirely relevant columns which are non-reproducible here):

A perusal of the afore-stated result makes it amply clear that coupons and cashback ventures have mammoth opportunities for growth and success in many emerging markets over the globe. The ‘Local monthly searches’ indicate the approximate 12-month average number of user queries for the exact matches on keyword for the given countries and language. For instance, in Russia 11, 500 is the average number of times internet users and shoppers search for the availability of coupon or cashback options!

Although India has the maximum number of average monthly searches of all emerging markets, a glance at the last column will evince anyone that it is also the toughest market, as ‘Competition’ is neck and back breaking here. Neighbours (near and far) such as Pakistan, Turkey, Indonesia, Philippines, China, Hong Kong, Morocco and Malaysia. Not only is the competition not a killer in these destinations yet, the recommended bid for ads in them is astoundingly slashed down.

In view of the fact that Affiliates have taken the Indian market by a storm, it is evident that replicating their respective business models in the relatively less saturated markets mentioned above will be in their best interest.

Affiliates should focus more on unexplored markets rather than saturated markets like US, UK; when venturing internationally. This is the prime reason why we started CouponzGuru’s international expansion with Singapore and will cover other SEA countries like Malaysia, Indonesia on priority.

Advertising is all about knowing the pulse of the consumer – what makes who tick. Human behaviour the world over can possibly be classified into 40 broad patterns, if even that many. What makes everyone tick, however, is a good discount and reduced prices for what they desire. Given the low risk and high reward nature of affiliate marketing, affiliates are simply using this eternal knowledge as a bridge to every corner of the globe. Ladies and Gentlemen, it’s a win-win.

About the Author:

Vikash is an engineer turned entrepreneur and is the founder of CouponzGuru.com, which is a leading coupons and deals website in India. He has worked as Business Analyst in IT for 5 years, before taking up his passion for Internet Marketing full time. You can know more about Vikash at his Linkedin Profile.